now i must say more than ever
by moeten
Summary: robin isn't in the story, and she's half surprised, because the way he's telling it she's sure she'd star as a swooning damsel. [random, not-at-all connected one-shots depository.]
1. we are far too young and clever

_over on livejournal, i've been slowly working my way through a massive 'entire series rewatch.' which is a lot of fun, and also has really put me in a, well, early seasons mindset. with that in mind, this [will be] a series of unconnected one-shots; just little scenes or bits of riffing or whatever. it's not quite 'a drabble for every episode,' but it's a way for me to get out my Feelings!_

 _probably mostly gonna be b/r or the friendship variation thereof (b+r?) — purpose #2 for this is 'distraction from my big dramatic story' — but eh, who knows. i'm also open to requests or prompts? BASICALLY THIS IS JUST A DUMPING GROUND FOR STUFF. hi._

* * *

 **1 January, 2007**

* * *

For all that she and Ted have been dating for half a year now, Robin's still relieved when he doesn't suggest spending the holidays as a couple. Christmas becomes a group event, and the gang stays up until sunrise on New Year's, drinking, alternating between action movies and Times Square footage, and gambling pennies on Marshall's newest game. It's the first time she's stayed in on New Year's, and it's nice in a way Robin doesn't know how to examine. She kisses Ted at midnight — well, five after; they'd been at the climax of _Alien_ — and clinks glasses with Lily and Barney, and thinks: _to another, to more_.

It doesn't explain how she wakes up on the floor with her head pounding, mouth dry, a scarf pillowed under her neck, and a weight on her sternum. She opens her eyes and finds herself staring at Barney's leg and ankle, his sock-clad foot resting on her chest. The sock is black and, hungover, Robin's first muddled thought is: _soft?_

Then a wave of nausea hits, and she groans, shoving his leg off of her and curling onto her side. Now she can see the kitchen, and, hey, it's Ted! He's sleeping sitting on the floor, his body wedged into the corner of the counters, embracing an empty bottle of champagne with both arms. She decides to leave him to it: moving closer and/or calling to him would be _too much_.

Beside her, she hears an unhappy groan, and shortly after a prodding against her back, before Barney's foot finds itself draped back over her side, resting on her arm.

"Dude," she whines, shoving ineffectively at it while also trying not to move, "stop foot-groping me."

" _Foot groping_?" Barney grumbles, offended and confirming that he is, in fact, awake. "Robin, if I was 'foot groping' you, I wouldn't be aiming for… for, uh…" he shifts his foot, "Your elbow?"

Robin grunts and rolls onto her back again. Barney's foot lands on her chest with an unpleasant thud. She pushes him off as she sits up, the apartment spinning around her and her vision spotting. The muscles in her back ache, her shoulders are stiff. One problem at a time.

Speaking of problems: "I can't believe this," Barney groans.

"Yeah, surprisingly, I don't want your foot on my boob," Robin mutters, massaging her temple. Okay. She's sitting. Progress. Next step: standing. Barney doesn't make the comment she'd expected, and she sneaks him a glance.

He sighs melodramatically.

"New Year's Day," Barney says, his voice trembling with disgust and melancholy. Robin groans and throws her scarf at him. He's lying on his back, hands folded over his chest like a corpse, staring up at the ceiling. " _Is_ there a more disappointing 'holiday?' A year has passed, time has marched ever onwards, and where am I? Where are we? Where are _we_ ; where _are_ we, Robin Scherbatsky? Lying on the floor of some unknown apartment —"

"My boyfriend's apartment," Robin interrupts.

"—a stranger's home," he continues.

"Your best friend's apartment."

"— and what do I have to show for it? Another year. Another number on the calendar, another cycle of dates and holidays and time, and me, me lying on the floor, the world spinning and me in the same place—"

"Ughh, shut up," Robin groans, as Barney doesn't seem to be planning on stopping any time soon. She drops her head back, and wishes she hadn't, as the movement sets her body into another confused _why is the earth spinning around me i'm probably dying_ tailspin. "Dude, are you always this melodramatic on New Year's?" He was pretty bad last year too, in the limo.

Barney heaves a great breath, a sigh, the weight of the world crushing him, et cetera. Then he launches right back into it. " _Trapped_ , as always; alone; lost; bereft of _love_ and _companionship_ and —"

"Ah."

"Ah _?_ " his voice rises in outrage. "' _Ahh_?' That's what you say, in the face of this realization, the truth, the knowledge that you, too, will someday die alone and cold and —"

"Yeah, you're just upset you didn't have some bimbo to kiss at midnight," Robin says. She glances at him again, and he's glaring at her. _Right in one_. He looks so put out that she snorts, shifting so that she's sitting on her knees in preparation for standing.

She glances over at Ted sleeping in the kitchen, blissfully unaware of the melodramatics he's missing, and then back at Barney, glowering up at the ceiling. "New Year's _sucks_ ," he whines.

"You'll survive," she says, giving in to the urge to laugh, and before she lets herself think about it, she shuffles towards him and kisses him on the cheek.

His wide-eyed look of surprise-slash-probable terror makes the impulse worth it. His mouth falls open, and she staggers dizzily to her feet, patting him on the shoulder, hiding her laugh. "Happy New Year, bro."


	2. is it ever gonna be enough

_This is set sometime around 'Little Minnesota,' and I'm not 100% happy with it, but, ehhhhy._

* * *

 **9 December, 2008**

* * *

"And then the producer said to me, 'we're searching in a different direction,'" Robin says, the coke-and-rum leaving her hyped up, her frustration jangling in her veins, and she knows Barney is the _worst_ person to talk to about things like this, but he was the only one in the booth when she'd come into the bar. "In a different direction? What kind of euphemistic bullcrap — what does that even mean? Are there different directions of news anchors that no one told me about?"

"Ethnic," Barney offers. "It's not enough that you're a chick anymore, now you have to be ethnic. Preferably foreign."

"I'm —" she says, and she's maybe a little drunker than she thought, because she actually pounds her fist on the table as she does; Barney raises a single finger to cut her off.

"No," he says, shaking his head. "Please. C'mon. Has there been a single time being Canadian has ever been a positive thing for anyone? Sure, there's the sympathy angle; it's the international equivalent of being a kid in the Make A Wish foundation…"

She laughs; she can't help it. He gives her this weird smile back, the one he does sometimes that makes her think, for some reason, of Ted: that whole cutesy bashful thing he used to pull out when they were dating, that's so out of character on Barney's face that she still doesn't know what it means. She drains her glass; the carbonation catches at her throat on the way down.

"It just… sucks," she says, waving for Wendy for another drink. "I've been back in the country for a month and this was only my second interview. Like, hah hah, I'm not 'ethnic,' but what the hell am I doing wrong here? What's the point? I almost want to just give up, get a job at McDonald's or something." Barney's kind of giving her a look, and she laughs wryly, taking a new rum and coke from Wendy. "And what am I doing, bitching to _you_ about this?" It's Barney. Even if he's clearly in a weirdly good mood today, letting her complain like this, she knows he'd rather be hitting on that blonde in the low-rise jeans at the bar.

He kinda pauses for a second and then gets offended, in the kind of super dramatic Barney way she doesn't take seriously. "What does _that_ mean? I'm an internationally recognized confidant, mentor to the unfortunate, confession-taker, and yes, I _do_ mean that in the sacramental sense —"

"Ew," she says. "It's just." She pushes her hair out of her face, kneads her forehead with both hands. "I know you hate this crap. Hell, _I_ hate this crap. But at least when I whine to Ted, he'll give me a pep talk about how great I am and I feel better about my shitty lack of career for ten seconds." Maybe it's because they used to date, and maybe it's a safety net Robin shouldn't take advantage of almost two years later, but… "and sometimes you just want that kind of dad pep talk, or for someone to lie about how great you are, you know?" and now she does laugh, to prove she's joking, but she's not one hundred percent sure she is.

"Not really," Barney says, frowning down at his gin and tonic.

"I guess I'm just not as awesome as you," Robin says, and she means for it to be a self-depreciating kind of joke, but it comes out weird.

"I'm sitting here, aren't I?" He moves his jaw, looks up at her again. "So — which one?"

"Huh?" she asks.

"Like I said, I'm great at mentoring poor lost souls," he says. "So which one? Blatant lies, or a pep talk?"

He really is in a good mood today. She smiles and takes a big gulp of her drink. "Surprise me."

She's about eighty percent expecting Barney to launch into a story that starts with _the year was 1893_ , but he doesn't. "Hearing you bitch about your job hunt is seriously annoying," he says.

"Off to a good start."

He ignores; continues. "So you're not ethnic enough for some douchebag network? I'm not exactly seeing that as a great loss, since obviously anyone stupid enough to shut the door in Robin Scherbatsky's face would be awful to work for. You're _awesome_. You, giving up your career to flip burgers or show your boobs for money?"

"Wasn't one of the options," she points out, he looks briefly dejected; rallies as she chuckles.

"Quite frankly, people should be calling and _begging_ you to host their dog-playing-the-piano stories."

"Or, you know, actual news," Robin interjects, but he has this whole fake-offended thing going and it's making her smile.

He waves his hand dismissively. " _Cats_ playing the piano. The point is…" There's a brief pause as he, presumably, invents a point. He picks at the grain of the table. "I think you're awesome." His voice is quieter; almost a little hard to hear over the chatter of MacLaren's. "Really awesome. The most incredi — awesome. Incredisome. So you have nothing to worry about, because, trust me, I don't say that about just anyone." There's less bluster in his voice; she almost thinks he's serious, and Robin also has a kind of weird flashback to earlier this year, crying over Simon, sitting where Barney's sitting right now. Barney looks her in the eye, and she hadn't even noticed he was slouching until his shoulders straighten.

She smiles. "Thank you," she says, and means it. He smiles back, but it's different, not his usual shit-eating smirk; it makes her think of Ted again, and she doesn't know why her brain keeps making these associations, all her exes, because it's super weird. It's nice to see Barney acting nice like this, pretending to be sweet because she asked, but it's also weird. That's why she's thinking about… she looks down at her glass, takes another gulp.

"Hey," he's saying, and then he scoffs; "it ain't a thing." He's smiling a little.

She lifts her glass again. "Do you think I could get the pep talk, too?"

He frowns a little. "What?"

"I mean, you've got to know some people in television in your mysterious career, right?" Robin asks.

He's looking at her. "Sure," he says. "Right. That was me lying, and now you want the pep talk." He's still looking at her, and she gets that weird feeling again. He frowns, drains his glass. "I don't know anyone in television."

"Oh," she says. "Too bad."

"Yeah," he says, suddenly restless.

"But seriously…" Robin clears her throat. "Thanks. You've been really sweet, I know this isn't really your thing."

"Hey," he says. He scoots over to exit the booth. "If there's two things I know how to do, it's giving awesome advice, and lying. And if there's _three_ things, it's getting the number of that chick you mentioned earlier."

She smiles, chuckles a little, because the sudden cocky bluster is funny. But as Robin watches him go off to hit on the blonde, she feels a weird sense of…

Something.

Whatever, she thinks, pulling out her phone. She has some applications to follow up on.


	3. got it going on

_This one's just silly, haha. I was joking around with Snowbound Mermaid and… I never said this was_ only _a B/R one-shot series! Just that they'd be main characters! :P_

* * *

 _ **2029.**_

* * *

The doorbell rings.

"Someone's at the door," says Pen.

Luke doesn't look away from his game.

"Luke, the doorbell's ringing," she says.

"I'm in the middle of a level."

The doorbell rings again.

" _Luke_ ," she says.

"Why do I have to get the door?"

"Because there's someone _there_." She's texting her friends on her watch. Luke pauses the game, throws down his controller and goes downstairs, stomping each step of the way.

He opens the door: it's a tall woman, her dark hair pulled back from her face, wearing a kinda tight top and shades and lipstick. Luke hangs on the doorknob. "Hey, kiddo," she says, pulling her shades down a little. "Holy crap, you've gotten tall."

"Hey, Aunt Robin," Luke says. He hopes he sounds cool.

"Aunt Robin?" Pen cries from the top of the stairs; she races down them and hugs her. Sure, _now_ she wants to answer the door, Luke thinks. "Ohmigod! When did you get back to America? Was Brazil, like, amazing?"

She throws her arms around Aunt Robin, who chuckles, looks a little surprised (hah, she doesn't want to hug Pen, Luke thinks triumphantly), pats her back. "Just last night! It's been forever since I got up here and I have a few days off… where's your dad?"

Dad and Aunt Robin hug, kiss cheeks hello. They get to catching up, talking about Aunt Robin's trip, work, about all of Pen and Luke's aunts and uncles and cousins, Pen jumping in, trying to sound like a know-it-all, like she's important or whatever. Luke stays mostly quiet.

At one point, Aunt Robin says, joking, "When did we all get so old? Look at us!"

"Hey, we pull it off," says Dad. "Personally, I'd been looking forward to dignified middle age for years now. And you…"

"I've still got it," Aunt Robin says, smirking a little, wearing dark red lipstick. Dad just laughs. "But seriously, I can't believe how grown up Penny and Luke are," she says. She glances right at Luke. "You look just like your dad," she says. "You're gonna get popular with the ladies in a year or two," Aunt Robin teases, and winks at him, and Luke feels warm all over.

* * *

A few weeks later, everyone comes over for dinner. After they eat, Luke and Marvin peel off to play video games; he doesn't really pay attention where all the girls go off to. Dad and everyone cluster in the living room to drink and swap boring stories from when they were young; he kinda listens to see if Aunt Robin talks about him, but she doesn't.

* * *

A couple of months later, Luke and Pen spend the weekend and Aunt Lily and Uncle Marshall's house on Long Island. They all campaign to be allowed to go into the city — _without_ parents — for the day, and when Aunt Lily shuts that down, Daisy suggests that Uncle Barney could supervise them instead. Uncle Marshall shoots that one down flat, knowing just as well as they do that Uncle Barney would let them do whatever they wanted. (It's a loophole Luke had personally figured out how to abuse by the age of ten.)

"What about Aunt Robin?" Marvin asks. "She hasn't left for Egypt yet, right?"

Aunt Lily says that if Aunt Robin is free and willing to shuttle four teenagers and one pre-teen around Manhattan for the day, then yes, they can go to the city.

She wins her bet. Aunt Robin is _not_ free, and sounded horrified by the prospect over the vidchat.

Luke is a little disappointed.

* * *

For Christmas, everyone comes over to Luke's house to open presents. Aunt Lily shows up early to help decorate, and Luke keeps bumping into tinsel and plastic reindeer. Everyone keeps hoping it'll be snowy and they can go sledding or caroling or something (everyone but Luke, because that sounds _super lameo_ ), but it doesn't.

Luke gets some new games and a hat and gloves to replace the ones he lost earlier this year, snowboarding lessons, some candy from Pen, and some pretty okay gifts from his Aunts and Uncles. It's a good haul, all things considered.

They go around in a circle, opening presents one at a time, which takes _forever_ , but he very casually sits himself next to Aunt Robin on the sofa, and leans his arm back on it casually, and they make small talk like: _Wow, does Daisy really read that much_? _Yeah, I guess so._ and: _This is taking forever. Yeah._

Aunt Robin nudges him in the ribs, leans in close to whisper in his ear: "Check it out, Penny has tinsel stuck in her hair."

She has on some kind of really nice smelling perfume. And she's wearing lipstick again. Luke has to clear his throat before nodding in agreement. Yes, his sister sure does.

He wonders if Aunt Robin would kiss his cheek if they passed under the mistletoe at the same time…?

* * *

"No. No. Noo _oooo_. No, no, no," says Ted.

Lily has collapsed against the kitchen island, her shoulders shaking with laughter. "He does! Oh my god, he so does!"

"I know, right?" Robin says, valiantly trying to keep a straight face as she takes a sip of her wine.

"Who does what?" Barney asks, coming into the kitchen with a load of plates someone must have bullied him into clearing.

"Luke has a crush on me," Robin informs him cooly.

His face splits into a grin. "No!" Unlike Ted, Barney sounds delighted. He dumps the dishes indiscriminately into the sink.

"No!" Ted echoes, horrified. "There — he's — no!"

"She's been teasing him all night!" Lily gasps. At Ted's baleful look, she tries to gather herself. "I mean, _and that's awful_."

"It's _awesome_ ," Barney sniggers, offering Robin a hand — which she slaps — as he crosses the room to Ted. He pats him on the shoulder. "Your kid's a _playa_."

"This is awful," Ted groans.

"What was the name of that song?" Lily asks. She stands from her stool, crosses over to the kitchen doorway. "Baby, what's the name of that song?"

"What song?" Marshall yells back.

"That song, you know, Jessie's …?"

"Jesse's Girl?" Robin asks.

"From the aughts!" Lily yells. "It was a hit after we graduated!"

"Oh my God, will you guys stop?" Ted moans, sinking onto Lily's abandoned stool. "Luke can't have a crush on Robin! It just — it goes against everything right in this universe!"

"Hey," says Robin. "It's not that weird. I'm still super hot." The look Ted shoots her is so baleful she decides to tone it down a little.

"He's his father's son, alright," Lily says with mostly a straight face.

Barney snorts into his glass. "Isn't heredity wonderful?"

"Can't you talk to him?" Ted asks Robin, ignoring the peanut gallery. "Make him, you know, get over it?"

Robin tries very hard not to be amused by the peanut gallery. "Come on, it's cute. He's thirteen. He'll get over it once the girls in his class start sprouting boobs."

" _Not helping_ ," Ted says. "You've gotta think it's weird, too. I mean, we used to date."

Robin doesn't quite understand Ted's logic, but she also thinks the situation is freaking hilarious, so she recognizes her judgement might be a bit off. Maybe. "Sure, but… to Luke, I'm just his super hot Aunt Robin," she points out.

"Actually," says Lily. "If you wanna gross out a thirteen year old with a crush…"

Ted perks up, then his face falls again. "Guys, I'm not that creepy. What kind of weirdo would I be if I sat Luke down and told him I used to … _hold hands_ … with his Aunt?"

"You did a lot more than hold her hand, amiright?" Barney interjects, holding his fist out for a tap. Ted ignores it.

" _That_ kind of weirdo," Robin offers.

"Just slip it casually into a conversation," Lily says. "Luke will be horrified. You've really never mentioned it?"

"I don't know," Ted sighs. "Kids of a certain age don't really care about those types of stories. They're barely even interested in how Tracy and I met, and I think we all agree, _that_ was the most epic tale any of us have ever heard in our lifetimes."

They all elect to ignore that.

"Whatever," says Robin. "You never would have met Tracy without yours truly. Tell him about what an ass you were chasing after me, all the _hand holding_ we got up to, blah blah Tracy, and there you go, there's your in. Luke will be in _tears_. And I don't _think_ Penny has a crush on me, but just in case, that ought to nip it in the bud." She winks.

"I can't use the story of how I met his _mother_ to just talk about _you_ ," Ted protests nobly.

"Okay," Robin says. She winks again. "I think I saw some mistletoe hangin' in the other room, so…" Ignoring Ted's strangled noise, she slides off her stool and heads towards the living room. Sniggering and calling for Luke, Barney follows.

Ted gazes hopelessly at Lily, hoping for her advice and wisdom. Marvin hit puberty years ago; surely she knows more about this than him. Lily shrugs and takes a smug-looking sip of her wine.

Marshall yells in from the dining room: "Stacy's Mom?"


	4. it's a risk but babe i need the thrill

**12 August, 2009**

* * *

Afterwards, after heartbeats have settled and breathing slowed, Robin gets out of bed. She says something he doesn't hear; scoops up her underwear, shirt; goes to his bathroom. Shuts the door. He listens to the taps run.

His heart is going fast, a twisty, nervous beat. It's no big deal. It's not like he never lets girls stay the night at his place; having sex first thing in the morning, without even having to go looking for it? Awesome. As long as they're out of his hair as soon as he's out of _them_ , what up, Barney is more than happy to open up his home to the nameless masses.

But this is Robin.

And it's different.

And that's fucking terrifying, because she's not some random chick whose name he doesn't know, and it's one thing to be friends with Robin Scherbatsky, and it's another thing to have sex with her forty-seven times (and counting), and they're both, like, _totally awesome things_ , but you smash 'em together and… and the door opens, and Robin comes out of the bathroom, wearing a tee-shirt and, disappointingly, shorts.

She must have brought them with her. Like she planned on staying the night. That's cool, though. That's fine. It's not scary at all, because they're totally still gonna do it later. His heart doesn't make a weird kinda _kerthump,_ because that would be lame.

He checks her out anyway, lifting himself up on his elbows, because she totally isn't wearing a bra under her shirt, and she sits back onto the bed like it's nothing, like this is something she does all the time. Did, he knows: she's had, like, boyfriends and stuff. Relationships. Ted.

Not that this is a relationship. It's just having sex, taking a break to get dressed, and sleeping. "Oooh," he says, as Robin starts to slide under the sheets. "Robin," his voice dripping with pity, "I have a policy: No shoes, no shirt, _all_ service."

" _Ooh_ ," she teases back. "Good thing I'm not looking for service." She fluffs the pillow he bought last week and he lies down. Tries not to feel nervous about something as lame as _sleeping next to a clothed woman,_ because it's happened more than three times in his life and it's not domestic at all.

Like: he used to sleep in his mom's bed when he had nightmares!

He winces at his own mental example.

"…seriously hate your toilet, by the way," Robin is saying, and he laughs, because his toilet is _awesome_ , and he wrenches up all his courage and sits back up enough to click off the bedside lamp. "It's like your entire apartment is designed to keep people _out_ ," she's saying.

"Uh, that's because it _is_ ," he says, lying back down in the dark. Lights from the city shine in the windows; his eyes quickly adjust.

"Whatever," she says.

He listens to her move around in bed, making herself comfortable, he guesses. He should make a move, he thinks. That would be better, easier: Barney knows how to do _that_ , and for some reason, it'd be way less scary to fall asleep exhausted after sex than to… fall asleep.

Or is he supposed to hold her? Reach over and… not feel her up, but, like — his mind shudders at the word — _cuddle_? He's not sure he knows how to do that. He's not sure he wants to do that. Like, what, he puts his arm around her, and… step two, she laughs at him? For being super weird? It isn't that he doesn't like — hell, he'll own it, _fucking love —_ touching her, her skin is nice and soft and she has boobs; he could put his arm around her and touch her boob, people sleep like that, that's what… people who sleep together do…

"Hate _everyone_ …" Robin is saying.

"Huh?" He wasn't listening. He rolls onto his side, and sees she's done the same, is facing him. Her face is in shadow. He puts his elbow under his head.

"Um," she says. He can't make out her expression. "It's not like you actually don't want _anyone_ in your apartment, right?"

"Please," he says. "The last thing I want is some clingy one-night stand loitering around here for years and years after I'm done with…" He kinda realizes what he's saying and what she's saying halfway through that sentence, when Robin abruptly turns away, rolls onto her other side, her hair shiny in the light from the window. Fuck. Dammit. His heart gets weird and heavy and taut.

"…Them," he says.

"Good night," she says. He looks at the line between her neck and her tee-shirt.

His stupid idiot heart is pounding.

He goes for it, his whole body kinda seizing up in fear and horror and nerves, scootches closer to her, dragging the blanket with, taking a breath and putting his arm awkwardly over her, his hand settling around her elbow. His fingers flutter against her arm, and he takes another breath and waits for her to question what he's doing or laugh in his face for trying, but she doesn't. Her shoulder feels stiff against him. Her hair is immediately in his face, and he kinda wedges his other arm between them to brush it out of the way.

She sighs.

"Um," he says. "You're not… you know."

His fingers brush against her neck, the back of her ear. She smells pretty good. She smells fucking amazing.

"Sorry," he says.

"You're … really stupid," Robin says, and he can hear her smiling, feel her body relax. She moves around a little, and it's still kind of awkward, but… maybe not as bad as he thought it would be.

"We're still gonna have sex in the morning, right?" he asks, just to be sure they're cool.

"Obviously," she says. He smiles and moves his hand a little to touch her boob. This isn't too bad. Maybe he can keep this up for another couple of minutes. And it's not like it makes him her boyfriend, cuddling her a little bit, so Lily can just go shove it. He's not Robin's stupid cuddly dumb _boyfriend_. He shifts, presses the crown of his head against the back of hers.

"Did you just … smell my hair?" Robin asks.

"What?" He pulls away. "No. Definitely not. Good night!"


	5. please say if i'm way out of line

**_2014._**

* * *

Robin comes down with this nasty virus that's been passing its way through the studio.. Like dominos, people have been getting it and calling out sick: Patrice was out on Tuesday, so she's 99% sure that this, as with most other things, is her fault. It's a Thursday when Robin wakes up clammy and feverish and with a heaving stomach, so she goes ahead and calls out for the day. Then, energy spent, she collapses back into bed and kind of stares into space for a while.

"You look awful," Barney reports, coming out of the bathroom. She makes a sort of groan that means _don't I know it_ , and he wanders away again. Time is kinda slippy and she wants to go back to sleep. He does pop back in a while later, now fully dressed. "Seriously, you look super gross." He puts a mug of something awful-smelling on her nightstand.

"You sure know how to make a girl feel special," she mutters, eyeing the mug. It's probably some of his nasty ginseng tea shit. She doesn't know if it's a holdover from his hippie days or what, but he loves anti-oxidant drinks.

"Yeah," he says happily. She rolls onto her side and watches him check his tie, hold up one a slightly different shade of red for comparison. "Okay," he says, going with the one he's already wearing. "I'm going to work, see ya."

"Hold up," she groans when he's halfway out of the bedroom.

He looks confused.

"No — 'do you need anything, Robin?' No, 'are you feeling okay, my dear wife?'"

"Umm, obviously you feel like crap," Barney says. "I brought you tea. I'm gonna be late." He sighs like it's a burden: "I can open the window if you _want_."

"Just go to work," she says, closing her eyes.

"'kay, bye!" He's gone before she can even bring herself to open them again.

* * *

Robin spends her day sleeping, trying to sleep, barfing, sleeping again, taking about three sips of the tea, and then barfing some more. She starts to feel a little better from the afternoon, probably because there's nothing left of her to barf up, and dozes with the bedroom TV on low for background noise.

Barney comes home a little bit after dark; she knows because he pops his head into the room. "Are you still sick?" He comes over to the bed and sits on the edge, and she wonders if he's going to feel her forehead. Instead, he sniggers. "Oooh, you look _awful_."

"Oh, shut up," she says.

"Seriously. Remember the time you didn't bathe for like a month and ate Cheetos out of your hair? _That's_ how awful you look. Remember the time you got really intense at the gym? _That's_ —"

"Seriously, shut it," she says with a tired sort of anger, and he clamps his mouth shut. "God, you don't have a single nurturing bone in your body, do you?"

He opens his mouth, closes it. "You don't like that stuff," he says.

"Just let me sleep," she says.

She feels him get up off the bed without another word.

* * *

He leaves her alone for a while. He doesn't come into their room at all, in fact, even to sleep himself. She half worries she hurt his feelings, but mostly feels like he deserves it: anyway, it's a lot easier to get some rest without him trying to chat or tell her how gross she is.

Probably around midnight, Robin actually starts to feel a little hungry, which is a good sign. She feels around, but there's no one else in bed with her. Good riddance. She staggers dizzily out of bed, grabs the cold mug of tea, and gropes her way dizzily towards the kitchen. She's not sure they have crackers, but they _might_ have some bread.

The lights are all on in the living room, and she smells and hears something in the same moment. She peeks around the corner: Barney is in the kitchen. _Cooking_. And talking on the phone. "Okay, but how do I _know_ when the vegetables are tender?" A second later: "I don't know, it's been like half an hour." And then: "No way, I'm not touching raw meat with my _hands_ , unless it's — no, don't hang up! I know it's late, _c'mon_ , Lil, you _gotta_ walk me through this! So I add the chicken to everything, then…"

"Barn?" Robin questions, and is immensely gratified to see him jump like a foot in the air.

He hangs up on Lily without a word of explanation, slams his phone on the counter, and affects a cool pose. "Oh, hey Robin," he says, his voice dropping down a full octave. He straightens his tie while lounging nonchalantly against the island, a soup ladle in one hand.

"Were you calling Lily at eleven thirty at night so she could teach you how to make soup?" Robin asks, pretty sure the answer is yes, going by the pot on the stove.

" _No_ ," he says, laughing unconvincingly.

She leans against the wall with her arms crossed and fights a smile.

"Hey, you're not in bed," he says, turning the stove off. "You're feeling better!"

"A little," she says. She waits for him to comment on her stringy hair, clammy face, tee-shirt and sweats combination, but he doesn't, this time. "I'm kinda hungry."

"I have some ch… vegetable soup," Barney says, face lighting up. " _Yeah_ , I made it. From scratch. It ain't a thing." He snorts. " _Hah_ , you said I didn't know how to take care of people."

"What time did you get home from work?" Robin asks, sitting on one of the stools and setting her mug down.

"Uh, seven?"

"It took you four hours to go grocery shopping and get Lily to walk you through a soup recipe?"

Barney clearly has no answer for her (because the answer is obviously _yes_ ), and he looks around desperately for something else to say, spots her mug. " _Robin_! You didn't even drink your tea! That's why you're still sick! This soup is wasted on you," he sniffs, splashing some into a bowl and onto the counter. " _Jeez_ , and you say I don't know how to take _care_ of people."

"Oh, shut up, moron," she says, smiling. The soup has no chicken or noodles, just carrots, celery, and potatoes in a broth, but somehow, it still makes her feel better going down.

* * *

The following Monday, Robin wakes up early, stretches. Barney's still huddled up on his side of the bed, so she prods his shoulder. "Rise and shine, champ," she says, reaching over to the nightstand to put on her rings and check her phone.

He rolls over a little, groans. " _Robin_ ," he whines. "I'm _sick_." He flings his arm over his face dramatically, but he really does look clammy and tired.

"Aww," she says, looking through her e-mail.

"Take care of me," he whines, reaching for her. "I need ice cream."

"Aww," Robin says, slipping out of his weak, sickly grasp and out of the bed. "Sorry, baby, I have work." She tries to keep a straight face as he glowers up at her. "Be a good boy and stay in bed," she says. "Maybe Lily can make you some soup."


	6. play hearts kid they work well

_set between 'miracles' and 'do i know you?'_

 _there might be a companion piece to this but tbh i just wanted to write idiocy._

* * *

There isn't a big moment. He's not Ted, so there isn't a big moment. There's no sweeping orchestration. The light doesn't get soft and dreamy; the air doesn't escape his lungs in a gasp or turn perfumey or rose-colored or whatever it's supposed to do when you're in love. Everything hurts: not the sweet agony of desire, but because he just got hit by a bus. Everything feels hazy, but that's the drugs.

He doesn't see her smiling face in the moment of the accident or anything: there's no time. He doesn't even see the bus.

But everyone comes into the room, and he sees her. It's kind of weird — how he keeps looking at her, can't stop himself from looking, like she's doing something interesting or is on fire. She isn't and she's not. But he looks over again and again.

Then Ted is talking and he hasn't lost his _mind_ or anything, so of course Ted is more important. Ted wants to be friends again and he'll let him because he doesn't really care or whatever. Then they're all talking, and she leaves, and it's not like the room loses all its oxygen without her or anything: Marshall and Lily are just kind of boring company.

And then she comes back, and nothing gets sparkly and glossy and perfect — except for her shiny, shiny hair — but a little later on she puts her hand on the cast on his arm (he doesn't feel it through the plaster; kind of imagines he does), and then rubs it like she's petting him, and says, _hey, I'm glad you're okay_ with an embarrassed smile, and he feels it in every inch of him.

Of course he writes it off as some kind of drug-induced fever thing: the way everything goes tight inside of him, warm but kinda painful and twisty means that he's hemorrhaging somewhere; the way he's suddenly grinning back, _really_ grinning, enough that it pulls at the stitch in his cheek.

He has Marshall call for help, since he's obviously having a heart attack, but Nurse Bill says he's fine.

He sleeps it off, makes it through eight weeks of recovery and PT, and his first day out of the hospital they all meet at the bar. Lily orders them all cokes in solidarity for his pain killer regimen, but Ted slips him half of his beer when she's not looking. He's tired, worn out in a weird old man kinda way, but feeling pretty good, wearing real clothes and sitting in the bar with his best friends and Stella.

Except there's a part where they're joking around about how Robin is the only single one now and she totally gets what he used to bitch about a couple years back (it's an awkward joke to make around Stella but Ted's look of alarm is hilarious). In a fit of generosity, Barney offers to take her out wingman style — picking up dudes is easy, he used to for James all the time.

Robin looks genuinely touched, says _aww, really_? She puts her hand on his shoulder and he gets that feeling again, that _my body is bleeding internally_ feeling.

By ten Barney is feeling sore and exhausted (probably from his clearly unhealed internal injuries); he's a little relieved when Lily suddenly announces she, Marshall, and Ted have a _thing_ and everyone has to go home. It's pretty weird, but he's glad he doesn't have to be the lame one. Robin offers to split a cab.

She touches his arm outside like he's some kind of invalid who needs to lean on a hot woman for balance (billion dollar idea alert), and he trips away at her touch and she has to kinda reach out and grab him by the elbow to keep him from falling over his withered hospital legs. _I knew Ted shouldn't have let you drink_ , she says, laughing.

 _Woah_ , he says, outraged by the very implication that half a glass of beer would knock him out, and he starts to say just that. She gives him a look that's something like pity as a cab pulls up, and he shoves her away to climb in.

They talk a little more on the drive across town, stuff he's missed, plans for their wingmanning, how Ted has transformed into an old woman, and he tries to ignore the ache in his jaw and bones, taps his fingers against the thigh of his pants in a staccato rhythm, tries to ignore it and also count the seconds until he can take his meds.

 _Hey_ , says Robin when they pull up to his building. He's tap-tap-tapping away on his leg, to the tune of Robin Sparkle's #1 hit — _lets go/get some drugs/c'mon everybody_ — she puts her hand onto his onto his thigh and his whole body stutters and stops.

Her gaze shoots up to meet his and she looks just as terrified as he does, which helps. A little. Not much. He should make a joke like _go ahead and move your hand up a little_ or invite her upstairs for a nightcap — _winkwink_ — but his throat is dry and his heart is pounding, and also everything is really starting to hurt.

She pats his hand lamely. "I'm really glad you're okay," she says.

"Uh-huh, goodnight," he squeaks out, scrambling for the door of the cab, throwing some money at the cabby, unable to look at anything really except for her, her eyes wide and face red with embarrassment. He closes the door. Lifts his hand in a wave. She bites her lip and turns away.

He has a seizure of some kind on the sidewalk, standing still and smiling in a fake sea-saw grin. That's the only explanation for it.

Probably she just thinks he's terrified because that was an intimate friendship moment and he hates that stuff. Actually, he's not convinced that _isn't_ what just happened, but he still practically runs to the elevator.

He takes his meds and a long shower, climbs into bed, and waits for the pain and the twisty, uncomfortable feeling to go away, the heavy nerves and the way his brain keeps firing things like _I like Robin's smile and hair and boobs_ and barely even in a sexual way. The way he wants to call her even though he has nothing to say, could just text, and _just saw her_. The way when he thinks idly (obsessively) back to their hookup this spring, it now seems kinda… rose-colored.

Perfumey.

After a while, the meds kick in and the pain stops.

The next day, she smiles at him in the bar, hands him a full glass of beer, and sets him up with a blonde whose name he can't remember. The blonde has _great_ boobs, but he spends the whole time wishing her hair was shinier. Darker.

The morning after _that_ , he calls Lily.


	7. we dig for things like you

**_2015._**

* * *

Robin had loved Ted. Really, she had. He was so sweet, so patient with her. Most of the time things had been so easy, effortless — like lying back in a warm bath, not having to worry or work or think. Plus, he was always up for brunch. Brunch is _awesome_.

But he'd also been so _needy_. Needing her to feel the same as he did, about food and television and feelings and weekend outings. Needing her to ask about his day and his job and his stuff, _all the time_ , even when it when she already knew from hanging out with him. Needing her attention and time, needing to be with her. If she had a bad day, he needed to make her feel better, cheer her up, give constructive advice when all she wanted to do was vent. Needed to take care of her, needed her to need him, and maybe that was how relationships were supposed to work, but after a while she was sick of it, sick of trying to match his level of commitment and love and sick of feeling like a crappy girlfriend for wanting to lie on the couch and watch _Heads or Tails_ instead.

She'd loved him. She really had. But it was _exhausting_.

It's seeing Ted with Tracy that reminds her of it all, seeing them flit around one another, Tracy tracking him through the room when Ted gets up to get everyone more drinks. They always seem to be on the same wave-length, the same emotional level — Tracy a little sharper, keeping Ted grounded; Ted a little more dreamy, keeping Tracy optimistic. They're a perfect match, anyone can see that. Robin watches Tracy call Ted over to take the baby; watches Ted beam as he does. She feels happy for them. She really does.

Selfishly, it alleviates her own guilt — like if she'd been a better girlfriend back in the day, Ted wouldn't have been lonely and desperate for so long. Like if she had just appreciated him, he could have been happy years before. She knows that doesn't make much sense, that she would have hated popping out a kid and moving up to White Plains, but Ted's still one of her best friends and seeing him quietly unhappy never made her feel great, especially knowing she, and her inability to be a good girlfriend, was partially the cause. She's glad he's found Tracy — glad to finally be off that hook.

"Dude, you're totally zoning out," Barney says all at once, and she starts because he's right, turns to look at her husband, sitting in the chair across the coffee table from hers. Her _husband_. It's been almost two years and sometimes that still startles her, that word.

"What?" she says. "No way. What are we all talking about?" Her face grows hot and the others all laugh at her.

"So anyway, Spokane," Ted chuckles. He's talking about a skyscraper he designed there, and now she remembers — the skyscraper people want to hire him for another job in Washington, the money is good but leaving Tracy alone with the baby is clearly bad. Barney is coming down heavily on _Ted needs to stay in New York forever_ , and keeps giving Robin pointed looks like _right?_

And that's why she zoned out — not because she's on team _break up the gang forever_ , but because she remembers Ted first pitching the building, when they _were_ dating, how proud of herself she'd been for being supportive and caring and how things had been great between them in the wake of that, until she'd gotten tired of it again.

After a while, mid debate, Barney takes the baby from Ted, wanting to bounce and coo over his goddaughter — he scoops her up and instead of retreating back to his chair, he comes over and sits on the arm of Robin's chair. "Penny doesn't wanna move out to boring old Washington," he coos in a gooey voice. "Penny wants to stay near her aunt Robin and awesome uncle Barney, doesn't she?"

"Haha," says Ted dryly.

"I don't know, pooh bear," Tracy says. "Obviously I want you to be successful and, not gonna lie, the money would be great. But my parents and family are all around here, and so are these guys," she says, jabbing her head at Robin and Barney. Ted replies, and the conversation continues without her or her husband.

Barney bounces Penny on his knee. She holds her head up and seems pretty alert, locking big dark eyes — she looks _insanely_ like Tracy — with Robin and smiling all dopey at her. "Hey, Penny," she says, smiling back because babies like that. She wonders what, if anything, Penny thinks at her age — or is it just a blur of smiling faces and feelings?

She glances up at Barney and feels a pang, because he's grinning down at the baby, his expression so soft and — and stupid, that it always makes her feel something, makes her wonder _what if_ , just a tiny bit. "Do you wanna hold her?" he asks, leaning his side against the back of the chair, half surrounding her.

"Not really," she admits, looking back at Penny. She reaches out and pokes Penny in the round tummy. The baby giggles, tries to grab at her fist with flailing baby hands. Robin lets her catch hold, smiling despite herself.

"Don't worry, your mommy and daddy aren't moving anywhere," Barney says to her, his voice gooey again. "They're lame but not _that_ lame."

"Admit it, you just don't want them to go because you'll miss playing with Penny."

"I'll also miss playing with Ted," he says frankly.

"That sounds wrong." Robin wrinkles up her nose to make a funny face for the baby. She'll say this for her nephews and nieces, they are _super_ easy to entertain.

"You're right. I'd much rather play with Tracy."

She rolls her eyes up at him like _really_? Ted catches his fiancée's name. "What's this now?"

"Tracy and I are gonna have a hot love affair if you move away," Barney threatens-slash-announces. "So I guess you can't. You're cool with that, right, Tracy?"

Tracy laughs, without any hesitation, and harder at Ted's slightly alarmed expression. "Yeah, I think that's fair," she says. Robin should maybe feel threatened, but she sees the way Tracy looks at Ted as she teases him, and really doesn't. There's no chance in the world Tracy ever would.

"Come on," Ted says, exasperated. "Robin, back me up here."

She brushes her finger along Penny's soft cheek. "I don't know," she says. "It might be nice to get this idiot off my hands sometimes. You should take the job."

Barney laughs, delighted she's going with the joke, and he's half leaning against her so she can feel the tension drain from his body. She makes another funny face so Penny will laugh. She looks at Barney's hands curled around Penny's torso, holding her on his knee, the wedding ring bright on his finger.

* * *

They miss the last train back to the city, so Tracy makes up the guest bedroom for them — empty walls, a cheap looking full-size bed, a dresser that looks like IKEA. Barney fusses until Ted finds him some good hangers for his suit, and Tracy hooks them up with a second quilt since 'the heat is kinda spotty in this part of the house.'

Barney hangs his clothes up carefully and wanders off — naked — to shower (she takes a minute to enjoy the stripping and his ass as he leaves; then equally enjoys hearing a surprised shout from Ted in the hallway); she sits on the bed with her laptop, doing some quick work catchup. She hasn't checked her mail since this morning, and discovers a series of problems in her inbox: big story has fallen through, one of the correspondents she's been working with is having some source troubles. Another story she's been working on needs editing before they can present it, and Patrice (ugh) wants her on her radio show next Monday ('or Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday! Whenever works for you, Robin!'). Robin responds to her e-mails, tries to work on a second draft of the Turkey story, and puts off Patrice's e-mail.

Barney comes back, now wrapped in a towel, his hair dark and wet. He climbs into bed — the right side, just like at home, they've never discussed it but that's always where he sleeps — and slides himself towards her, not that there's a ton of room in the first place. He settles himself down, head parallel to her hip bone, drapes his arm over her lap to rest on her thigh. "We should have sex," he tells her, skimming his hand up under her shirt.

She considers the spreadsheet on her laptop, _places we've had sex 2015._ They're down sixteen percent from last year. She also considers the e-mail she's in the middle of, trying to fix Conners's editing problems. "I have to finish this up," she says.

"Come on, Ted and Tracy are in the next room and you'd have to be quiet, it'd be super hot," her husband whines. She wavers. Sensing weakness, Barney presses his mouth to her hip, shifts his weight over her so that she has to push her laptop down towards her knees. He braces his hand on the mattress on the other side of her body; kisses her hip, her belly, and when he makes it to her bellybutton she has to fight a ticklish giggle and pushes his head away from her. "Okay, slow down, champ. I really do need to finish this."

He moves away, flops back down onto his pillow. She runs her hand through his damp hair, he settles his palm in the space between her hip and navel. "You suck," he says, tucking his head against her side.

"Maybe in the morning," she says, pulling her laptop back up her lap. He grins, and she high-fives his outstretched hand.

He moves away after that, shifting around until he's comfortable. She turns off the bedside lamp and types in the glow of her screen; he settles down facing away from her, falls asleep after a little bit — she can tell because he stops moving. Robin finishes her editing, and then moves on to the next task because she feels like she's on a roll. It's when she's on her third and notices it's almost one that she stops typing.

The house is quiet. She stares blankly at her screen, listens to Barney's quiet breathing. She closes her laptop and puts it on the nightstand, climbs off the bed to undress in the dark. It's too late to shower, so she strips down to her underwear and tee-shirt, puts her rings on the nightstand, and climbs under the covers, shivering a little. Barney doesn't stir. She lies on her side, facing him, looking at his back and shoulder.

This is the wrong time to think about Ted again, but she does, her mind drifting back to earlier that evening, how relieved she feels whenever they come up here to see Ted's new family. That she can care about Ted again, without feeling guilty for holding back his happiness. If she'd been a good girlfriend to him back in the day, she realizes sleepily, she wouldn't be married to Barney. She spends a couple of seconds trying to imagine this universe — Barney's earlier joke about an affair with Tracy melds in her brain, makes her imagine up a world where Barney and Tracy have a kid, where she and Ted are visiting them — she remembers, vaguely, a fight she and Ted once had: he'd wanted to go away for the weekend to Vermont, and she'd wanted to anchor a weekend report she wasn't scheduled to. He'd wheedled at her until she'd agreed, even though it had been a great opportunity. They'd ended up having a pretty good time in the end, but she also rememberes the frosty drive up north, the look he'd given her when she'd wanted to pack her laptop, the argument they'd had that evening about it.

She tries to imagine Barney in this other world. Still sleeping around, chasing high after high, adventure after adventure, looking for whatever it was he was after. She likes to think it was _her_ : likes to flatter herself that she was the thing missing in his life, love and someone to love him, be with him, even when he's a jackass or awful. Someone to keep him in line, keep him company, keep him satisfied. And she likes to think she's that person, likes to think she does that, _owns_ him in that way, that all the promises and efforts and mistakes he's made, all the emotions he's poured into her, that they belong to her. That _he_ belongs to her, that she can take care of him in a way no one else can. She likes to think that if he didn't have her, he wouldn't have anyone — that even in a world where they'd never gotten involved, there'd still be a hole in him. That no one else can have him like she can. That no one else can make him as happy.

That was what it comes down to, really. She can watch Ted with Tracy and be completely happy for them, happy to be free of the feeling that she's letting Ted down, that she was a bad girlfriend and the cause of his unhappiness. But she can't do that with Barney. She can't, for a second, imagine a world where he's with someone else and she's happy for them. Can't imagine a universe where Barney's with Tracy and she's smiling in their living room, making faces at their child, and thinking _thank God_.

Because — she reaches out, touches his back, rubs her palm up over his shoulder, then down his side until her fingers curl around his waist. She moves herself closer to him and spoons him properly, just for a little while, feeling the plane of his belly with her fingertips. This causes him to move in his sleep, make a quiet noise. She presses her head against his shoulder, breathes in the clean, soapy smell.

Because she needs him too. Not in the way that Ted needed her, with daily check-ins and a compulsive desire to take care of her, be the best for her — and not even, she has to admit to herself, in the way she wants him to need _her_ , with all his heart, to belong to her and her alone. She needs him to be with her, to notice when she's distracted and try to distract _her_ when she's too busy. To always have ten wildly inappropriate jokes when she's feeling down, to follow her wherever she goes. To _always_ check out her ass when she walks by.

To not ask for much, to not need her to give anything up, to be a forceful enough personality that she can't ignore him, even when she kind of wants to. To not expect anything but that they'll be together and have fun together, and not require anything more.

To need _her_ , to let her set the pace and the narrative of their weird little love story.

She's clinging to him a little tightly; she feels him stir, mutter a little as he rouses. "Robin…?" he asks sleepily, trying to pull himself loose from her. She lets him go, shifts away. He works up the energy to roll onto his back, head tilted towards her and eyes half open. He's frowning, confused and tired.

She thinks about Ted again, just for a second. "Hey," she says softly, tucking her arm under her pillow, pressing her other hand against the bed. "You know I — you know I'm glad we're married, right?"

He blinks at her, too tired to show much emotion. "Yeah," he says. He rolls onto his side, facing her. His eyes close.

"Because I am," she says. "I wouldn't have married anyone else."

"Mm," he says, eyes closed. "Not even Kevin?"

"Well. Three months, max," she says.

"Just like Nick Cage and Lisa Marie," he sighs, stretching. He looks at her in the dark. He doesn't tell her he wouldn't have married anyone else — she remembers Quinn — but she knows those marriages wouldn't have lasted. Quinn couldn't take care of him. He didn't need Quinn. "If you're trying to have sex now, give me a minute to wake up," he says after a moment of quiet thought.

She smiles. "I love you," she says. She doesn't ask him if it bothers her she was working and they didn't have sex earlier, because she knows it doesn't.

"I love you too," he says easily, sleepily, with a dopey smile.

She pulls herself over him and kisses him, her elbow on the bed by his shoulder, hand cupping his ear, and he reaches up and plays with her hair as he kisses back, lazily at first, but she feels him wake up after a minute. In a couple of ways. She hadn't intended on waking him up for sex, but within a few minutes the quilts are gone and she's on her back; his mouth is back on her navel and she laughs at the ticklish feeling. " _Shh_ ," he says, his eyes glinting up at her, "you'll wake up Ted."

She whacks the side of his head and he kisses her hip bone, and she keeps herself quiet and does think of Ted — just for a second, half a second, asleep in his bed with Tracy, her on the other side of the wall with Barney, and all the lines between the four of them, pasts and futures and choices, Penny in her crib. Ted needing her to be a good girlfriend and it exhausting her, wearing her out, leaving her tired and guilty; her in bed with her husband, needing him to need her more than anything else, the meaning in there, or maybe the lack of meaning, his hand splayed on her thigh…

And then Barney's other hand — and she stops thinking about anything at all.

* * *

Ted and Tracy will sort out Spokane. She and Ted wouldn't have, just as Barney and any of his past bimbos wouldn't have been able to, just as she and Barney _could_ , or Marshall and Lily, and it's still a little scary to put them all on equal tiers, but in a sleepy post-sex haze it all seems to make sense, come together in her head: Ted needing her and wanting her was exhausting; Barney needing her and wanting her is the only way it should be. It means something, she's sure.

Tomorrow morning, Ted will lecture them for being noisy, Tracy will roll her eyes and mediate and cut up Penny's pancakes, Barney will laugh and preen and drag her into the conversation whenever she gets caught up in her e-mails. They'll take the train home to Manhattan, shower and change: she'll work and he'll write and get bored and pester her into going out to dinner.

But for now, Robin yanks some of the quilts free from her already-sleeping husband, wraps herself in them and settles herself back into bed. He's managed to starfish himself, and she nudges at his leg until he moves, rests her head on his outstretched arm, her hand curling around his bicep, and goes to sleep.


	8. hush we both can't fight it

_set at various points in s3. sorry the ending is kinda weak._

* * *

"Have you thought about what I said?" Barney asks without so much as a _hello_ , sliding into the booth opposite Robin with a glass of clear alcohol. They're all meeting up to get some dinner tonight, but Robin was early.

"I try not to think about _anything_ you say," she says easily, raising her eyebrows at his cocky smirk. Truthfully, she has no idea what he's referring to.

"Ha, ha," he says. "You know."

"Mm, that's where you're wrong," she says cheerfully. "Unless you're talking about that weird 'cuddling exists only to allow the coping of feels' theory, because I still disagree with that one." Or he's talking about the Platinum Rule or the Grooming Triangle or the Tiers of Color or whatever his relationship law of the week happens to be. She's given up trying to keep track.

"No, not that," he says, waving his free hand. "Besides, I stand by it. Why else would any sane human choose to 'spoon?'" His expression curls in disgust.

"Love? Companionship? It feels nice?" Robin almost adds _Ted's a good cuddler_ , but it's only been six months since they broke up and it gives her a weird feeling to even think it. Like, _and it'll never happen again_. She doesn't say it, obviously.

"You know what else feels nice?" Barney asks, leering again. He raises his glass to his mouth.

"Hah," she says, rolling her eyes and taking a sip from her own beer.

"There's no way you haven't thought about my proposition," he continues, his voice dropping an octave, rich and smooth and deep — it'd work for her, Robin thinks, if she wasn't so used to hearing it used on bimbo after bimbo.

So she chuckles. " _What_ proposition?"

His eyes narrow after a beat. "We should have sex."

" _What_?" Robin sputters, her voice going high as she reflexively pushes herself away from him, flush against the back of the booth.

If Barney's flat affect is anything to go by, he's a little offended. "We get along really well, not looking for something serious, _but what about Ted_?" he adds, raising the pitch of his voice. Hearing her own words thrown back to her, Robin suddenly remembers the conversation over a year before. " _Nada_ about Ted," he continues. "Not anymore. You've been there, done that; you're single, I'm bored. We should have sex."

"Wow," she says, her face feeling warm. Stupid face. "You sure know how to put the moves on a woman."

"You have no idea," he smirks. She accidentally meets his eye for a second and then concentrates on her beer.

"Bad idea," she says.

She looks up in time to see him frown. "We're both available, neither of us are secretly in love with anyone, _and_ we're of equal levels of attractiveness."

"True," she says, and has to fight a smile at his logic. "But we're friends. Bad idea, Barney."

He looks across the table at her, frowning a little, and she feels a niggle of dread — the same feeling she'd get when Ted tried to argue his case, when Derek would plead an apology, when any number of her boyfriends had gently laid hand on hers and tried to get a yes. Ted did that for months; she's not sure she could deal with it from Barney. He's _way_ more annoying.

"Your loss, Scherbatsky," he says lightly, raising his glass and smirking at her over the rim. She remembers the first time they had this conversation, how he'd shrugged and redressed and they'd played board games and watched TV.

"Yeah," she says, feeling a wash of relief. "Not sure I'd call it a _loss_ , exactly."

* * *

Except it happens again.

They go out together one evening in February, because Temple Beth Israel is having an open dance night. Barney insists Tango Nite is perfect ground for picking up men _and_ women ("You'll be the youngest and therefore hottest woman there. Those silver foxes will be all over you. Plus: _divorcées_."): Robin isn't sure she buys that, but it sounds fun; besides, Lily and Marshall are mid-move and Ted is too busy trying to seduce his dermatologist to be good company.

The pickings for men turn out to be pretty slim, but Robin has a good time despite that. The instructor's a total hottie, even if he's also totally gay: Robin makes herself his best pupil and is _rocking_ the Argentinian Tango by an hour in. It reminds her of Gael and last summer, in a good way.

It's also fun to watch Barney hit on his divorcées. For a man who loudly proclaims his love of the buxom idiot, he sure has a thing for cougars.

By nine the event is winding down; left without a partner, Robin grabs some grape punch and sits on one of the folding chairs lining the wall, spreading her legs out before her, her heels sore. She's barely had any time to relax before Barney materializes before her.

"Awesome, right?" he says, his head turned in the direction of a silver-haired woman waving to him on her way out the door. "I told you this place would be singles heaven."

"Mm, they're a bit out of my age range," she says, laughing as he waves and makes a little bow towards his lady friend.

"Sure, but you brought whats his face to Thanksgiving," Barney says, eyes on his buddy's receding backside. She doesn't have much of a retort to that. "Before you cheated on him with Ted," Barney muses.

She purses her lips. "Bob and I weren't serious," she says, feeling oddly guilty.

"Uh-huh," he says. "Dance with me."

"What?" It's a non-sequitur if she's ever heard one, but he grins down at her.

"C'mon. We've been here all night and haven't danced once. Dance with me."

It's his smile that does it — if she thought he was trying to dance to get in a feel or rub up against her, Robin's pretty sure she'd say no, but he's grinning at her so cheerfully that she feels herself smile back. "Fine," she says. "One dance."

He offers her his hand. She puts her cup on the chair next to her, and takes it.

He's a good dancer — of course he is; it's exasperating but not at all unexpected — but they fall into something between a tango and a waltz, his fingers twisted with hers and her keeping her face a little bit away. It feels a little intimate in a way that makes her clumsy, but he's so dramatic about it, full of crisp movements and weird little leg extensions and an overly serious facial expression that it becomes funnier and easier. "You have to kick your leg out more," he tells her, and she practically kicks the air as he laughs; they become more and more dramatic as they dance, Robin channelling not her teenage self but every single season of _Dancing With the Stars_ , his fingers warm on her shoulder blade.

"Is this how you seduce those sexy divorcées?" Robin breathes in his ear, goading him, and he yanks them into a turn with a laugh.

"Why, Robin," he says in his fake, smooth voice. "Are you turned on right now?" He lets go of her shoulder and kind of pulls as he steps away from her, still holding her hand — she's caught in a spin without even knowing how but goes with it, laughing and twirling.

"Not in a million years," she laughs, spinning back into his arms, her other hand clutching his shoulder. She takes a swaying step but he's not dancing; his hand is holding hers and his other drops from her shoulder, sliding lower down her back…

"I _could_ turn you on," he says, leaning in close —

Something twists in her, goes hot and fast — she steps away from him lightly, shaking her head, smiling. "Come on, Barney. Don't ruin this."

He looks maybe a little surprised, then sulky. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"I'm having a great time," she says, uncurling her fingers from his. He lets go of her hand when she does. "Don't make this weird. We're friends."

"Friends with benefits!" he says brightly. She can't tell how seriously he's taking this.

"Just friends." She smiles at him hopefully. She can't read his expression, but it isn't angry or hurt.

"Friends," he says. He extends his hand out to her again. "Besides, I have Mrs Rothenstein's number."

* * *

So a few weeks later, when she gives in to her curiosity and asks him to put the moves on her, just for fun, just as a joke, just to help _him_ with his saboteur —

Whatever. It's his fault, anyway.

* * *

One Sunday they're a little bored, so they go to the IKEA in Brooklyn. Robin buys a new lamp and some coasters, and then they park themselves in the cafeteria to eavesdrop on angry couples having meltdowns over dressers or hangers or sofa covers.

"I see her point," Barney is saying as Robin chows down on some gravlax. "Wooden hangers are far superior to their inferior brethren." He takes a sip from his lingonberry juice box.

"Isn't that kind of redundant?" she asks. "Inferior, superior…"

"Sure, _Ted_ ," he says. "I didn't want to say _plastic_. Or heaven forbid, _wire_."

She rolls her eyes. "Hey, check it. Family of four at three o'clock," she says, pointing over Barney's shoulder with her fork. Mother, father, and two exhausted looking little girls, the younger of whom is already in tears. Barney swivels himself around to look, arm draped over the back of his chair.

"Shoot me if I ever have children," he says gleefully.

"I'd shoot _myself_ for having kids first." After saying it, Robin thinks it came out weird. Like she just accidentally implied they'd be conceiving this orphan together.

The mother fusses over the toddler and keeps glaring up at her husband, who grows progressively angrier as he argues his case for bunk beds.

"Wait, are we murder-suiciding _our_ kid?" Barney asks, lifting his eyebrows in amusement.

"No," she says, "I'm murdering _you_. The kid gets adopted by Ted."

"Awesome," he laughs. They tap fists.

Suddenly, the couple with the kids begin all-out screaming at one another — she's distracted and riveted. Barney jumps up from his chair and slips onto the bench next to her, to have a direct view of the match: wife is screaming at husband about how he _never_ listens to her and is upsetting the girls; husband screams back about how he's never appreciated; both the children scream, the elder about wanting ice cream. Barney and Robin are not the only people looking, but they're certainly the most blatant.

"This is the best!" he hisses in her ear, and she laughs. They make commentary through the fight, Robin whispering the wife's lines and Barney doing voices for the husband and children.

After a minute or two, the husband stalks off and the wife, snapping at her daughters, pulls them after him. The cafeteria is oddly quiet for a moment before regular conversation returns.

"Dude, when you said _let's go to IKEA_ I thought you were crazy," Robin says. "But this is surprisingly awesome."

"What up?" he crows. She high fives him, and only then realizes just how close they're sitting. Sure, Robin's side of the table was the one with the direct view of family feud, but their legs are pressed together, his shoulder against hers. Her hand is on his thigh, his hand inches away. She can smell his cologne, or is it aftershave? It smells amazing. Sure, sitting close made it

Robin clears her throat and scoots away. "Hey, I'm gonna get some cake. Want some?"

He blinks up at her, looks almost, briefly, uncertain. "Totally," he says. "Hey, I'll pay."

"Nah, I got this," she says, and hurries to the serving area, feeling her face flush. She grabs two slices of chocolate cake and loads them on a tray, feeling confused and unable to make sense of it in her head.

The cashier is a pretty girl in a yellow polo shirt. In the three or four times Robin has been up here getting snacks, this girl has always been at the register. This time, she leans in as she hands Robin her change. "Hey, can I ask you something?"

"Yes, I'm the reporter for Metro News One," Robin says with a modest smile.

"No, um," the girl giggles, blushing. "That hot guy you're here with? Is he your boyfriend?"

In the three or four times Robin has been up here getting snacks, the cashier has eyed Barney (who shamelessly eyed her back). Robin had laughed at it each time. Now she feels weirdly annoyed. "No. No, no, um, he's just a friend," she says, fumbling with her pennies. "A guy friend."

The girl looks excited. There's no line behind Robin. "Oh, can I ask you a favor?" She reaches for a scrap of receipt paper and jots something down. "Can you give him this? Maybe?"

"Sure," Robin enthuses, taking the receipt. "Because he's my friend. My guy friend." It's a phone number; of course it is. That doesn't bother her, except somehow it really does. "I'm going to sleep with him."

The girl looks surprised. _Ashley_ , she'd written on the receipt. "Sorry?"

"I mean, probably. I haven't slept with him, or anything." She can't turn it off, her mouth is on some suicidal autopilot. "Not yet. But eventually. It's _gonna_ happen. Sorry. Bye." _Bye_? Her face red and hot, Robin pockets the phone number and her pennies and grabs her tray of cake with what little dignity she has left.

She sees Barney across the cafeteria, sitting on the bench and looking at his cell phone. He looks up and spots her and grins.

She smiles back.

It's inevitable, she realizes. She is someday going to sleep with Barney Stinson. Because he sits too close and smells too good and wormed his way into her brain. She's going to sleep with him someday. He'll seduce her or dance with her or put the moves on her and she will have sex with him. Just to get him out of her system, just to move on with her life, just once to get it done.

Maybe then things will get back to normal. Maybe then he'll turn back into her sleazy jackass friend.

"Here ya go," she says cheerfully, handing him one of the plates of cake. She sits down on the bench next to him with her own slice.

"Ten o'clock, the undergrads moving in together," Barney says. "Will their relationship survive IKEA? _Let's find out_ ," he intones dramatically.

Robin laughs and takes a bite of chocolate cake and watches the weepy girl pleading with her boyfriend about some picture on her phone.

She sits next to Barney. He doesn't move away and neither does she.

She's going to sleep with him.

She doesn't know when, but soon.


	9. looking for something dumb to do

_this is literally the cuddliest thing i have ever written lmao. it feels weird…_

* * *

The sheets are smooth against her bare legs.

Robin sighs contentedly and twists herself further into them, reaching blindly across Barney's chest to search for blankets to pull around her —

The geography of the bed sinks in, and Robin is suddenly wide awake. She's lying on her side, wrapped in the sheets, her face pressed into a pillow and forehead touching his shoulder, one of her legs thrown over his. She's naked. She runs her free arm over his shoulder, across his chest, down towards his belly. He's lying on his back, this exploration reveals. He also appears to be naked. He also smells amazing. How the hell does he always smell so amazing?

She sighs and pushes herself further against him, her eyes still closed. She's comfortable and wants to go back to sleep… she stretches her arm over his chest, between his side and arm…

"Ow," Barney complains. He moves his arm and then shifts away from her; the sheets rustle and pull away from her. She finally opens her eyes to see him struggling to sit up, examining something on his side. "Your stupid ring scratched me," he whines, looking for some tiny scrape.

"Your fault for getting me such a big rock," she says, yawning, rolling onto her back, and lifting up her left hand so the diamond there catches the light. The _engagement ring_. All at once, she can't stop herself grinning, at it, at herself, and then at Barney, who has stopped whining about imaginary scratches to grin dopily down at her. "Hi," she says.

"Hi," he says back. Barney says back. Her _fiancé_. Says to her. To _his_ fiancée. Who is currently super naked except for her huge goddamn rock, in his bed, next to her totally naked _fiancé —_ her grin only widens, but all at once it kind of hits her — the rooftop, the paper, the fear and anxiety and _hopelessness_ that had been carrying her through the last weeks, the knowledge that she'd fucked up, messed up _hard_ , let go of what she had been too dumb to realize she had wanted, _again_ , and then the dawning understanding on that rooftop, that none of it was real, that it was all pretend, that she hadn't thrown him away for the last time — that he hadn't given up on her —

And then it had been a blur, fragments of moments, in the elevator down, kissing him and trying to hold onto him, him breaking away every couple of seconds, buzzing with excitement, trying to brag about his play, talk about every detail of the past few weeks, her kissing him again and again to shut him up, try to get him to focus on the task at hand —

Back to his place, back to his bed, finally, _finally_ , and he still wouldn't shut up, kept trying to talk when all she'd wanted was to celebrate the engagement, until finally she'd gotten her dress off and that had done the trick —

"Ohh, ohh, crap," she says, throwing her arm up over her eyes: it's hitting her now, all at once, and she feels like she's about to cry. She presses the heels of both palms against her eyes.

"Woah, bro, hey —" Barney says, sounding alarmed, she feels the mattress shift and his hand curl around her wrist. "Bro, you can't _cry_ ," he says. "That's not cool. Baby."

"No, I'm not," she says, and then she's giggling, she can't help it, the awkwardly tacked on pet name and that his reflex is still to call her _dude_ or _bro_ — how scared she was last night, how happy she is right now. How he just proposed, and yet doesn't know what to call her. It's ridiculous. It's too much. "I'm not crying. It's just —" She doesn't know what it is. Excess emotion.

"Excess awesomeness?" he offers. "Because Robin — I mean, _baby_ — if you're crying _already_ this is probably not gonna work out in the long run."

"You need to work on your pillow talk," she says, taking a deep breath to steady herself and removing her hand from her face to look up at him. He looks a little worried and a lot confused. She reaches up, pulls him down to kiss her. He responds happily enough, his hand landing on her breast — which also makes her laugh, because that was what he used to do when they dated, he hasn't changed — except he _has_ , because they're _engaged_ , and, just — _holy shit._

Her eyes close and arms wrap around him, and he holds himself over her. She can see where this is going and is absolutely fine with that, but after only a couple of minutes he pulls himself away a little. She makes a frustrated sound and opens her eyes to pout at him, trying for enticing.

It works: he chuckles and swallows and looks down, his face nicely flushed. "We don't have to get married," he says, all in a rush.

Her head drops back and hits the pillow. "You _really_ have to work on your pillow talk," she groans, her hands trailing down his back to his waist.

"I mean it," he says to her neck or shoulder. The sincerity in her voice causes her stomach to drop a little, some of her doubts to come back in a knot — was this part of the play? Was there another step on that paper? Is this —? He looks her back in the eye and winces, ducks down towards her and kisses her on the nose. She wrinkles it and fights a smile, because she's not sure this is a habit she wants him to get into. Even if it's simultaneously adorable. "I know you don't like marriage," he continues, his voice low and sincere. "So if you don't wanna get married, I'm cool with that."

"You're sending me mixed signals here," she says, raising her left hand to pet the side of his face, run through his mussed hair, so she can see the ring again. He looks a little frustrated and she grins at him.

"I'm being serious," he complains, rolling off of her to collapse in a huff beside her.

It feels almost like an accusation. "Hey," she says, sitting up, frowning a little bit. She brushes her hair out of her face and resists the urge to pull the sheet up around her. "You proposed to me, remember? Last _night_?"

He nods, turns his head to the side to look at her. Instead of last night's bragging, he looks serious, maybe a little petulant. "I needed to prove I was serious about you. About _us_." He lies on his back, one hand splayed over his stomach. "And I am. I'm crazy serious." He sounds a little hesitant, and that is somehow reassuring: that maybe she's not the only one swept away by all this. "I can have us on a flight to Vegas in an hour. Or we can have some Marshall-and-Lily church wedding that I can officiate again."

"I don't think you can officiate your own wedding," she says, shifting closer to him and rubbing his shoulder.

He shifts closer to her, raises himself up a little and then rests his head in her lap. She raises her eyebrows, but he doesn't make a further move on her. "But we don't have to get married, if you're not into that," he says, looking up at her. "That was all me. I just…" he takes a breath. "Wanna be with you. From now on." He shrugs, then looks serious again, like he's willing himself not to joke it away. "For the rest of my life."

She pets his hair and kind of gets it. At no point in the last few weeks had Robin been thinking about marriage, about cornering Barney and forcing him to propose. It had been sex and fear and desperation, certainty that she'd lost him for good, pushed him away for the last time, that she had to, _had_ to take it all back. That was different from marriage. That was different from knowing you'd want to be with the same person five, ten, twenty years from now.

But it's also been almost five years since the _first_ time they dated, and see how those feelings turned out.

"Baby," she says patiently, her hands in his hair, naked in his bed. She raises her eyebrows at him. "once you've made the sale? Stop selling."

He grins up at her. "Are you sure?" He asks it kind of seriously, but there's a glimmer in his eye that makes her grin back, and as he speaks that seriousness melts away. "Marriage is kinda scary. Also, once you commit yourself to this package," he says, gesturing at his body, "you can't go back. You won't _want_ to go back. I mean, those other losers you've dated can't have rocked your world like I can and _have_. You're gonna be stuck with me or a miserable sexless existence."

"These romantic speeches are _exactly_ why I fell for you," she sighs, sarcastic, knocking her knuckles gently against his head.

"Really?" he asks, smiling, looking questioningly up at her.

She gives it half a second's thought, to make sure she's sure. Weeks of stress and heartbreak and fear, his head in her lap in his bed, a huge rock on her finger. "Head over heels," she sighs, stroking his cheek.

"I love you," he says, for the fifth time since last night (not that she's counting).

" _That's_ the one I was after," Robin says, laughing, and bends to kiss (and touch, and have sex with, and spend her life with, and _marry_ ) her fiancé.


	10. so please say you'll meet me halfway

_i've kind of fallen out of this show and am trying to get myself back in! i just re-watched this episode the other day, so…_

* * *

Barney exaggerates the story later, telling it to Ted and Marshall and Lily, all of them on Tantrum hangovers and fussing over his brace, his propped up ankle. How he'd valiantly fought those Canadians for love and honor of _America_. How they, those men of a savage nation, had overpowered him through vile cheating. How the doctors said he might never recover. Robin isn't in the story, and she's half surprised, because the way he's telling it she's sure she'd star as a swooning damsel. Lily gets Barney some juice with a bendy straw; Ted and Marshall make sympathetic sounds. You _were_ awesome, buddy.

But in any case, that's not how it happened.

Here's what did:

The guys approached Barney at Tim Hortons, asking him to stop trashing their country, leaving off the _please, if you don't mind_ as a sign, one Barney, as expected, doesn't notice.

Robin isn't really going to let a bunch of hot Canadian men (mmm, those plaid shirts) beat up her boyfriend, but before she can tell them to go jump in Lake Simcoe to cool their heads, eh?, Barney opens _his_ mouth, says, "and who calls a donut hole a _timbit_? That's just stupid," and Robin sighs in frustration.

Hot Guy #1 shoves him, probably not too hard, but it's enough that Barney yelps, takes a step backwards, and trips over his chair and to the ground. There's quiet chuckling and muttered "sorry for laughing, eh?"'s, and Robin steps between her splayed out boyfriend, moaning about his shoulder, and the hot guys, her fist raised for hittin'.

"Back off," she says, channelling not Vancouver Island but Manhattan, "or I will mess you up so bad your momma's gonna feel it back in Cowtown!"

"Hey, sorry," Hot Guy #2 says.

"But your boyfriend is sort of rude, eh?" says #1. He glances down at the loudly moaning Barney, his expression pitying. "Get the hoser to a clinic, I think his shoulder's popped."

"I'm not a hoser!" Barney whines as the crowd backs off.

He tells the others that they held him down, punching for what felt like hours; that he was beaten with hockey sticks and pelted with timbits. His leg might be broken; his shoulder was dislocated; he thought he'd never walk or see again.

That also isn't true, but Robin felt a hot flash of fear when she'd turned to see him, still lying on the floor, his shoulder at the wrong angle, his face pale: she'd thought he was joking, exaggerating, whining - and he is, muttering 'ow' and 'the pain', only now she believes him. "I am going to sue all your asses!" she yells back at the no longer so hot guys — "I'm a famous news person, and I'm gonna own you bastards!" She steps at them, they step back; she crouches down by her prone boyfriend.

"That was really hot," he whimpers; "really American."

"Shut up, jackass," she says, whacking his unhurt arm with some force.

(He leaves that out of the retelling, too.)

Later on, after the retelling and the telling of Ted and Marshall and Lily's various adventures, after Ted goes to bed on a Tantrum hangover, Robin lets Barney stay over. He'd insisted on full casts for his sprained ankle, pulled muscles, dislocated shoulder; she ignores his lewder comments, helps him out of his clothes and into her bed.

"Don't injuries turn you on?" he asks hopefully, once he's in his boxers and sling and not much else. There's some bruising, but she barely gives it a second glance.

"Fights with chairs don't really do it for me," she says with insincere sympathy, pulling on fleecy pajamas. She briefly entertains a mental scenario where Barney had had a cool fistfight with Hotties 1 and 2, but it's so out of character she can't do it. Besides: "You're not getting laid tonight. Not with a dislocated shoulder."

He sighs huffily, and she turns off the light and climbs into bed, on his uninjured side. It's the opposite of how they usually sleep, and it feels weird: that she's in the wrong place, and that they have a usual. They're a couple. A couple with an usual.

Because it seems appropriate, she curls up against him a little, her hand on his uninjured arm.

"It was super hot when you were going to sue the lumberjacks," Barney says in a quiet, thoughtful voice.

"Still not getting any," she says, but she's thinking: _you smell pretty nice_. He's not the fittest guy she's ever been with, but she likes the muscle under his skin, the warmth of his body. He's lying still, and maybe that means he won't kick her at three AM, shove a limb into her face, or accidentally sleepwalk out for once.

"I thought you were going to shoot someone," he continues, lying on his back, unmoving even as she curls against him.

"Mm-hmm," she says.

"Crazy hot," he says.

She ignores him, her forehead pressed against his shoulder, her hand on his chest.

He's quiet for a minute or two; long enough she's starting to hope he's asleep, but then he speaks again. "It's hot when you take care of me," he says, his tone not quite matching his words: his voice quiet, the Barney-version of hesitant.

She knows what he means but not what to say back. "You went to Canada to get me," she says, running her hand across his torso, stopping when her fingertips touch the nylon sling. Sometimes, times like this, she thinks it might actually work out with them, that he won't drive her crazy and they won't crash and burn. "Don't be an idiot," she says. "Go to sleep."


End file.
